Colonial amnesia: Why West Africa remembers differently

    Cheta Nwanze | Editor’s picks | Feb 19, 2025    
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The legacy of colonialism is a deeply complex and often painful subject, evoking different emotions and memories depending on the region. Across Africa, the scars of European domination are undeniable, but the intensity of resentment and how colonial history is remembered vary significantly. One striking thing I have noticed is that Anglo-West Africans—particularly Nigerians, Ghanaians, and Sierra Leoneans—do not seem to harbour the same level of animosity toward colonialism as their counterparts in East and Southern Africa. This divergence in collective memory is not accidental; it is rooted in the specific nature of British colonial rule in West Africa, the absence of large-scale settler colonialism, and how colonial violence has been memorialised—or, in many cases, forgotten.

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